Finding a Story: What Makes a Strong Story

I think this is an interesting question.

Let's stick with the Paramedic theme.

Say we set about answering some of the questions from our basic Research Plan.

Say we found out, from the web, that there is a governing body who represents them.

Say we phone this body and maybe speak to someone who deals with the media.  They tell us an event is coming up, a fundraising thing were some paramedics will be demonstrating what they do.  And the media person says, "I think you should come and cover this, it's a great story".

Is it?

It might make something, and I say might, for a news piece, if its a slow news day. 

But it's very manufactured.  It's not 'real', in the sense that, its a staged event.  Not an everyday occurrence.

Plus, is it a strong story?

Well, we might measure our ideas as stories, once we've got them by comparing them to something.

Here's a link to a piece of research carried out by charities.  It looked at what journalists thought made good stories. (scroll down to the section that says: What make a good story)

You can use this as a list to compare your story against, asking yourself, does your story at least make a couple of these catagories?

http://www.volunteergenie.org.uk/making-a-story-plan